#Bookworm….Nah

After filling the big shoes of Mr. Narayan Murthy, when Mr. Vishal Sikka was asked his take on the education system in India, his response was, “I think there is an incredible fascination for Nach Baliye and singing and dancing, and I wish we get back to a little bit of math and science.”

While earlier youngsters did not have as many avenues and books were his best friend now I would l would also disagree that avid readers are nerds.

I can visualise a typical scene where the parents are hooked on to their favourite reality show and pester their children to be in the room and read. Why should they?

It depends what you define a bookworm as. A person devoted to reading or a person who wants to enjoy and learn to read.

Practically speaking in today’s world both are important, being socially active (by socially I don’t mean buys kids a smart phone with social media loaded) and having the content to part with when the kids are social. You don’t want your kid to have all the knowledge but not the confidence/experience to make friends and play J

Before we shift all burden on the child to read or not read some points to ponder:

Courtesy: Survey done by Hindustan Times

Is there enough content for them? – NBT is an apex body established by the Government of India (Ministry of Human Resource Development) in 1957 to develop reading habits and create a book culture in the country. The trust publishes more than 1,500 titles every year in almost all Indian languages besides English. This includes 25% titles for children

Do Parents think it’s important? When parents themselves feel other media will make the kid smarter, where do we see the kid inculcating the habit

Reading perception management – How does the kid perceive reading, is it a punishment or a reward J I remember my father gifting me a British Council Library membership and I would go travel from Malabar Hill to Churchgate to read books and borrow some for my friends too.

To do or not to do is the question, we make the society and books are and will always be a man’s best friend.